Electric door-operating apparatus



(No Model.)

0 H HICKS & R F TROY ELECTRIC DOOR OPERATING APPARATUS.

' Patented Feb. 18, 1896.

fizz/672202;; 0506771056 '02:: A5 Ro er [15"0 I OLIVER H. IIIoKs ANDROBERTUS TROY, OF oHIoAco, ILLINOIS.

ELECTRIC DOOR-OPERATING APPARATUS.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 554,819, dated February18, 1896.

Application filed August 8, 1895. Serial No. 558,607. (N 0 model.)

To all whom it may concern.-

Be it known'that we, OLIVER H. HICKS and RoBERrUs F. TROY, citizens ofthe United States, residing at Chicago, in the county of Cook and Stateof Illinois, have invented a new and useful Improvement in ElectricDoor-Operating Apparatus, of which the following is a specification.

Our invention relates to an improvement in the class of electricdoor-operating apparatus such as is set forth in Letters Patent of theUnited States No. 461,122, granted to R. F. Troy, one of the jointapplicants herein, on the 13th day of October, 1891, and in LettersPatent of the United States N 0. 505,270, granted to us on the 19th dayof October, 1893.

Our present improvement relates to the electric mat as the primaryactuating means, by stepping on which the normally open circuit of themechanism for controlling the m0- tor which operates the door is closedto produce the operation.

We have found it very desirable in the use of an electric mat as theprimary actuating means for our electric door-operating apparatus tomaintain a portion of it in the condition of having its circuit openwhen the door is in a closed or part-way closed position, even thoughthe mat be depressed or, stepped on, in order to prevent the door frombeing opened against or in the face of a would-be passer through thedoorway, and to permit a person standing on the mat at the inner side ofthe, door, as in a store, to look through the transparent door withoutcausing it to be operated. Accordingly we have devised, for effectingthis purpose, the improvement illustrated in the accompanying drawings,in which Figure 1 is a broken perspective view, dia-.

grammatic in its nature, showing our improved mat arrangement applied tothe electric operating apparatus of a door; Fig. 2, a horizontal sectiontaken through the door above the mat; Fig. 3, a view like that presentedby Fig. 2, but showing a double or folding door with our mat improvementapplied accordingly; and Fig. 4, an enlarged view showing, in plan, aswitch device which we apply over a swinging door for holding out out ofthe circuit the portion or portions of the mat which it is desired tomaintain dead While the door is in its closed or partway closedposition.

The construction and operation of the electric mechanism, the operationof which is controlled by the mat, being old or at least involving nofeatures of novelty which we desire to set forth in the presentapplication, it is not shown herein in detail; but its opera tion may bethe same, or substantially the same, .as that of the mechanism set forthin our aforesaid patent, No. 505,270, which operates, generally stated,.by pressure exerted on the primary actuating means to close the circuitcontaining the primary actuating means and cause the closed door to bereleased from the motor mechanism which has operated to close it,thereby to permit the recoil of a spring to operate to open the door.When the pressure on the primaryactuating means is removed, the circuitscontaining the motor mechanism are closed to cause that mechanism toclose the door.

In the drawings, A, Fig. 1, is a single door supported to swing onhinges in a manner to open in one direction, and we show it to beprovided with a coiled spring device B for opening it, the spring, asillustrated, being provided at and adjacent to the hinged edge of thedoor to be tightened by the closure thereof and be thus adapted torecoil when released by freeing the door and open the latter by theforce of its recoil.

C denotes a generator for supplying the electric current, and M denotesthe incased electric mechanism (motor and clutch devices set forth indetail in our said Patent No. 505,270) connected with the door, near itsupper end, by an arm I" and connected with opposite sides of thegenerator respectively by a wire w and a wire w, the latter containin ga switch device E, which is normally closed (if the operation of theelectric mechanism be to close the door when opened, and of the springto open it, as may be the case, though not necessarily.) The lever q ofthe switch device is controlled by the hinged armature D of anelectromagnet D in a line 20 leading by one branch to a switch device Fat the top of the door and shown in Fig. 4 as comprising the followingconstruction:

ICO

on the base a terminal m, connected with the metal portion of the lever0 by a spring m, which tends to hold the metal end of the lever incontact with the terminal a. The wire leads to the terminal 977,.

G is the electric mat, of any well-known or suitable generalconstruction, involving usually a sheet of any suitable materialcarrying on its lower surface spring-contacts l, which normally holdthemselves out of engagement with, but are caused by pressure exerted onthe mat to engage with contacts Z. The eontacts Z are all connected bywires 10 with one side of the generator 0, and some of the contacts Zare connected by wires w with the wire which leads through theelectromagnet D to the other side of the generator 0.

For our purpose we prefer to form the mat G in separate pieces G and Gone at the side of the door-jamb toward which the door closes and theother at the side thereof toward which the door opens, the latter piecebeing extended, as indicated at t in Fig. 1, laterally beyond the freeed ge. of the door and being divided, as indicated by the dotted line at1 either actually or only by the arrange ment of the circuits thereon torender the part i an electrically separate section, and the pieces G andG also form electrically separate sections. The contacts Z on the matportion G and those on the section are connected by the wires w with thewire 10 but the contacts l on the mat portion G are connected by wires10 directly with the ter1ninal n.

011 the door A at its upper end is a rigid finger or projection 70,which, when the door is closing, engages the lever 0 of the switchdevice F and turns it to separate the switchlever from the terminal 01and maintain it so separated while the door remains closed.

As will be seen, when a person steps on the mat portion G or on thesection 25 the circuits are closed as follows: from the generator 0 bywire 10 through the magnet D, thence by wire 20 to wire 10*, which leadsto the con: tacts Z on said mat portion and section, thence through thecontacts Z over wire 10 to the generator. From one side of the generator0 there leads a wire w through the switch E to the mechanism at M,returning by wire w to the other side of the generator.

The. circuit of the mat portion G is to be traced as follows: from oneside of the generator C by wire 10 through the magnetD to the. terminalon of the switch F, thence from the terminal n over wire w ito thecontacts Z, and returning by wire 10 from the contacts Z to the otherside of the generator. Thus by pressure on the mat portion G" orsectiont the magnet D is energized to attract its armature D and openthe switch E, thereby opening the circuit containing the mechanism M andfreeing the door A from the normal holding effect of said mechanism topermit it to be opened by the recoil of the spring B. It will also beapparent that the door in openin g releases the finger from theswitch-lever 0, thereby permitting the spring m of the latter to bringand hold it in contact with the terminal 02, whereby the circuitscontaining the contacts land 1 on the mat portion G will be closed whena person passing through the doorway treads upon that portion of themat, so that the switch E will be kept open until the person clears themat. Moreover, it will be apparent that while the door is closedpressure on the mat portion G the contacts Z of which are on the line10, cannot affect the door-operating mechanism,since the circuitincluding that line, which leads to the terminal 71 of the switch deviceF, is normally broken by the normal separation of the lever o from thatterminal. In order, therefore, to cause the door to be opened by aperson approaching it from the side toward which it opens he steps uponthe mat-section t, which, being to one side of the space through whichthe door opens, prevents opening the door in his face.

IVhen there are two doors A and A opening in opposite directions, asindicated in Fig. 3, the mat portions, respectively at opposite sides ofthe doors, may be arranged as shown to bring one of the mat portions Gat the side of each door from which it opens and a mat portion G behindeach door or at the side thereof toward which it opens. In this instancethe circuits of the mat portions G are the same as those described inconnection with Fig. 1, and those of the mat portions G- are also thesame as. the circuits of the corresponding part in Fig. 1. Hence thereis no need for repeating the description or showing the circuits in thedrawings. With this modified construction, however, owing to the natureof operation of the double or folding doors, the section tmay be omittedfrom each mat portion G \Vhile we have shown and described our improvedelectric mat structure as applied to a door operated by electricmechanism, it may be used to advantage with other than electricmechanism for operating the door when the mat-circuit might be the onlyelectric circuit employed. Hence we donot limit our inven tion to use inthe particular connection herein set forth at length. Moreover, thedetails of construction involved in our improvement maybe departed fromwithout departure from our invention, so that it is not to be understoodas being limited to such details.

What we claim as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, l5?- 1. Incombination with a door and its operating mechanism, an electric matcontrol- IIO ling the operation of said mechanism and divided intosections, one section being inoperative to control said mechanism in oneposition of the door and operative to control said mechanism in anotherposition of the door, substantially as described.

2. In combination with a door provided with electric mechanism foroperating it, an electric mat forming the primary actuating means forcontrolling the operation of said mechanism, and divided into sections,one section being inoperative to control said mechanism in one positionof the door and operative to control said mechanism in another positionof the door, substantially as described.

3. In combination with a door provided with electric mechanism foroperating it, an electric mat G forming the primary actuating means forcontrolling the operation of said apparatus and divided into a sectionG, at one side of the door and sections G2 and t at the opposite sidethereof, said sections G and i being operative to control said mechanismin all positions of the door, and said section G being inoperative tocontrol said mechanism in one position of the door and operative tocontrol it in another position of the door, substantially as described.

4:. In combination with a door provided with electric mechanism foroperating it, a switch device F supported adjacent to the door andhaving a spring-controlled lever and terminals m and n, a projection ison the door engaging said lever in the closing of the door, and anelectric mat forming the primary actuating means for controlling theoperation of said mechanism and divided into sections, having theircontacts connected with the switch device, one section having itscircuits normally closed except at the mat-contacts thereof, and theother section being normally open at its mat-contacts and at said switchdevice, substantially as described.

OLIVER H. HICKS. ROBERTUS F. TROY. In presence of- M. J. FROST, J. N.HANSON.

